Livingston County final multiplier announced by Illinois Department of Revenue

Are you ready to deal with your property tax bill? It will be arriving soon enough as the process took a step with property assessment having been completed and Livingston County having been given its factor.

According to a release from David Harris, director of the Illinois Department of Revenue, Livingston County has been issued a final property assessment equalization factor of 1.0000.

This is being assigned for the 2023 taxes that will be paid late this year. This is the same equalization factor for the county as it was last year.

The release notes that the property assessment equalization factor — the "multiplier" — is the method used to achieve uniform property assessments among counties, as required by law. It points out that this equalization is important because some of the state's more than 6,000 local taxing districts overlap into two or more counties. This includes school districts and fire protection districts.

The reason for this is that if there was no equalization among counties, substantial inequities among taxpayers with comparable properties would result, the release states.

A law passed in 1975 says that property in Illinois should be assessed at one-third (1/3) of its market value.

However, farm property is assessed differently with farm homesites and dwellings subject to regular assessing and equalization procedures, notes the release. Farmland is assessed at one-third of its agriculture economic value and not subject to the state equalization factor.

It is noted that assessments in Livingston County are at 33.22% of market value, based on sales of properties in 2020, 2021 and 2022.

The release points out that the equalization factor is determined annually for each county by comparing the price of individual properties sold over the past three years to the assessed value placed on those properties by the county supervisor of assessments/county assessor.

It says that if the three-year average level of assessment is one-third of the market value, the equalization factor will be one (1). If the average level of assessment is greater than one-third of market value, the equalization factor will be less than one (1). And if the average level of assessment is less than one-third of market value, the equalization factor will be greater than one (1).

The good news for taxpayers is that a change in the equalization factor does not mean total property tax bills will increase or decrease. Tax bills are determined by local taxing bodies when they request money each year to provide services to local residents. If the amount requested by local taxing districts is not greater than the amount received in the previous year, then total property taxes will not increase even if assessments increase, states the release.

The assessed value of an individual property determines what portion of the tax burden a specific taxpayer will assume. That individual's portion of tax responsibility is not changed by the multiplier.

This article originally appeared on Pontiac Daily Leader: Livingston County final multiplier announced by Illinois Department of Revenue